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Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

Education Arm of The Buck Institute – PBLWorks – Receives a $2.9 Million Grant from the Bezos Family Foundation

Novato, California – The Buck Institute for Education (dba PBLWorks) was awarded a $2.9 million grant from the Bezos Family Foundation to design an innovative social studies and civics curriculum that uses a Project Based Learning (PBL) model. The new PBL units are being designed for teachers of grades 4-12 and will be available free as Open Educational Resources (OER). 

The curriculum units are being designed with teachers in Colorado and California, in collaboration with experts in culturally-responsive teaching, and with a curriculum design team at the Buck Institute for Education (BIE).

The project draws on recent studies published and supported by Lucas Education Research (LER), a subdivision of the George Lucas Education Foundation (GLEF), which underscore the impact that PBL, professional development, and high-quality instructional materials can have on student outcomes across grade levels, racial/ethnic groups, and socioeconomic groups.…Read More

5 things you need to know about device buyback programs

While most school district officials are aware that they can sell their digital learning device fleets at the end of their lifecycles, many don’t do it because they don’t understand the device buyback process.

This is a key finding from a recent study conducted by Project Tomorrow, best known for its annual K-12 Speak Up education research.

The survey showed that while just 7 percent of district administrators and 14 percent of technology leaders were unfamiliar with buyback services, only a little more than half said they were somewhat or very likely to participate in a buyback program over the next two years.…Read More

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5 myths about device buyback programs

While most school district officials are aware that they can sell their digital learning device fleets at the end of their lifecycles, many don’t do it because they don’t understand the device buyback process.

This is a key finding from a recent study conducted by Project Tomorrow, best known for its annual K-12 Speak Up education research.

The survey showed that while just 7 percent of district administrators and 14 percent of technology leaders were unfamiliar with buyback services, only a little more than half said they were somewhat or very likely to participate in a buyback program over the next two years.…Read More

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Scholastic Launches Early Childhood Program to Start Every Child’s Learning Journey with Both Academic and Social-Emotional Support

PreK On My Way™, Designed in Collaboration with UTHealth’s Children’s Learning Institute and Yale Child Study Center, Brings Together the Latest Early Childhood Education Research in Language, Literacy, Math, and Social-Emotional Development

NEW YORK, May 20, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — Scholastic has announced the launch of PreK On My Way, a comprehensive PreK program, with print and digital resources available in both English and Spanish. At the heart of the program is the Mind Builder™ skill-building methodology, developed with the Yale Child Study Center to support social-emotional learning, executive function skills, motivation, and creativity. PreK On My Way also incorporates UTHealth’s Children’s Learning Institute’s Developing Talkers/Hablemos Juntos research model, which is proven to significantly expand children’s receptive and expressive vocabulary skills.

To learn more, visit: www.scholastic.com/prekonmyway.…Read More

PBL students excel compared to peers in typical classrooms

Students in project-based learning (PBL) classrooms across the United States significantly outperform students in typical classrooms, according to four studies released from Lucas Education Research, a division of the George Lucas Educational Foundation (GLEF), along with researchers from five major universities.

In the first study ever reported on project-based learning and Advanced Placement results, research scientists at the Center for Economic and Social Research at USC Dornsife found that students taught AP US Government and AP Environmental Science with a PBL approach outperformed peers on exams by 8 percentage points in year one of a randomized controlled trial, and were more likely to earn a passing score of 3 or above with the chance to receive college credit. In year two, PBL students outperformed peers by 10 percentage points.

The yearlong curricula were developed by University of Washington professors alongside Seattle and Des Moines teachers. For example, in one of the five projects in the AP Government course, students answer the question, “What is the proper role of government in democracy?” by conducting a presidential campaign, taking on the roles of candidates, lobbyists and media. In the first of five projects in AP Environmental Science, students explore sustainability by conducting a personal environmental impact audit and developing a proposal to reduce consumption.…Read More

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CAE Partners with Education Research and Development Institute

Council for Aid to Education, Inc. (CAE), a leading provider of performance-based, authentic assessments measuring essential college and career readiness skills, announced it joined the Education Research and Development Institute (ERDI). Partnering with the well-respected 35-year-old organization, CAE will contribute as a thought leader and work collaboratively to develop insights that will inform the evolution of its student-centric educational solutions and services.

“We are honored to partner with ERDI whose members comprise our country’s top education practice leaders committed to ensuring all students have access to the highest quality learning experiences,” said Bob Yayac, president and CEO of CAE. “Joining ERDI’s community allows CAE to leverage the latest in PK-12 research and on-the-ground experience to best meet the needs of students today and into the future.”

ERDI gathers top PK-12 education leaders and solutions providers from more than 250 school districts across the U.S. who are focused on the continuous improvement of public education, to analyze, discuss, and propose solutions for current problems of practice in education.…Read More

10 reasons edtech works sometimes, but not all the time

There are a number of factors—10, to be specific—that are likely to have a sizable impact on the success (or failure) of and edtech implementation.

The EdTech Genome Project, a collaborative effort of more than 100 education research and advocacy organizations, reached unanimous consensus on an initial list of those 10 factors hypothesized to have the greatest influence on whether an edtech implementation succeeds or fails.

Related content: How better edtech management empowered our district…Read More

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Video: How edtech connects

At SXSW EDU 2018, The Christensen Institute’s Director of Education Research, Julia Freeland Fisher, reveals innovative schools that are creating learning models that strengthen teacher-student relationships, and emerging edtech tools that promise to expand students’ networks to experts and mentors from around world.

Julia’s current research focuses on emerging tools and practices that leverage technology to radically expand who students know – their stock of “social capital” – by enhancing their access to, and ability to, navigate new peer, mentor, and professional networks. She is the author of the forthcoming book Who You Know: Unlocking Innovations that Expand Students’ Networks. Prior to joining the Institute, Julia worked at NewSchools Venture Fund, a venture philanthropy organization that supports education entrepreneurs who are transforming public education. She also served as an instructor in the Yale College Seminar Program. Julia holds a BA from Princeton University and a JD from Yale Law School.

Visit https://www.sxswedu.com/ to learn more about SXSW EDU and subscribe to SXSW EDU on YouTube for more great videos https://www.youtube.com/user/SXSWEDU.…Read More

Study finds successes, challenges in shift to intensive principal preparation

A report released from the Illinois Education Research Council (IERC) at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, in partnership with the University of Chicago Consortium on Chicago School Research (UChicago Consortium), assesses the progress of sweeping legislation to redesign the way school principals in Illinois are prepared, with the goal of improving schools statewide through higher quality leadership. The report summarizes findings from a two-year study assessing the progress of these ambitious reforms and describing the changes that occurred as a result of the new policy.

“This in-depth look at principal preparation programs is the latest in our series of studies of Illinois’ school leadership and provides insights into the challenges programs face after major reforms and the innovative ways that they have navigated through these challenges,” says IERC Executive Director Janet K. Holt.

Illinois’ new principal preparation policy required universities across the state to shift from a general training model geared toward multiple school administrative positions to more targeted and selective principal-specific preparation beginning in the 2014-15 school year. As a result, the study finds that preparation programs experienced substantial, but not unexpected, declines in enrollment.…Read More

Education can make you taller in old age

The Telegraph reports that researchers found that those who had completed secondary education shrank nearly 2cm less in their dotage than the illiterate, who had not even completed primary school. The team from the Universities of Southern California, Harvard, and Peking say it is the first time it has been shown that choices we make later in life, rather than in early childhood, can influence our height. All humans go through physical changes with age, including an increase in body fat and decrease in bone mass. Previous studies have suggested that we start to get smaller as early as in our 30s, with changes to the spine and bones all having an effect. Men lose on average 3.3cm by their deaths. Using data from a survey of 17,708 adults beginning at age 45, the researchers showed a number of new influences – including eductation – which determined how much we shrank…

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